Goldman Sachs vice president charged in insider trading case

A Goldman Sachs vice president was arrested on Thursday in California on insider trading charges filed in a New York court.

Woojae Jung (37) awaited a court appearance in federal court in San Francisco to face six counts of securities fraud and a conspiracy charge.

Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman said in a release that Mr. Jung “violated his duty to his company and traded on stolen insider information, over and over again.”

A lawyer for Mr. Jung did not immediately comment.

Mr. Jung, who lives in San Francisco, was accused in court papers of trading the securities of a dozen companies based on inside information. Authorities said he made over $130,000 illegally from 2015 to 2017.

The Securities and Exchange Commission also brought civil charges against Jung, who worked in both San Francisco and New York.

Michael DuVally, a Goldman Sachs spokesman, said Mr. Jung has been placed on leave.

“We are aware of the situation regarding Mr. Jung and are cooperating with legal authorities on the matter,” he said.

Joseph Sansone, chief of the SEC’s Market Abuse Unit, said Mr. Jung violated his employer’s rules about outside investment accounts when he carried out illegal trades through a brokerage account held in the name of a friend in South Korea.

“Like others before him, Jung’s alleged scheme failed when our data analysis uncovered the account’s suspicious trading pattern and, despite Jung’s attempts at evasion, traced the trading back to him,” Mr. Sansone said in a release.